Little venting and frustration

B

Brian@202020

Veteran
I've always bought Panasonic cameras, I thought they were way a head of the curve in their codecs, but always lacked a little in the sensors and hardware. For years my complaint with the Sony's were the codecs, but their hardware was top notch. My thoughts, like everyone else's here in MN, was the hardware doesn't matter if the codec can't take advantage of it so buy Panasonic. With the advent of affordable external recorders, codecs have become less important. Don't get me wrong doing everything in camera is a benefit, just not as huge in my opinion as it once was. I live in Minneapolis and this was a Panasonic town. Since the DVX100, nearly everyone owned a Panasonic. The rental houses here were easily 80-90% Panasonic. The 5D changed that with an affordable large sensor solution. Now everyone is requesting large sensor cameras. I believe, as much as I like the AF100, the AF100 was the the turning point for Panasonic. Although I think the m43 sensor size was the perfect choice, Panasonic should have, in my opinion, use that little codec benefit they still had and made the AF100 with the AVC-Intra codec to stay ahead. Or at least had 2 models released at the same time, the AF100 and the AF200, much like the AC160 and HPX250 are. The HPX250 would have been awesome last year. It'll be a great camera no doubt, but I think in the grand scheme of things it'll fall a little flat. They know codec's so why get rid of that in the AF100. I think so many people were put off by the AF100 and it's lack of P2 support that it damaged the companies reputation permanently, at least in this town. People here were trying to sell extra P2 cards. Everyone thought P2 was over and wanted to get as much as they could for their extra cards while they could. I bet Panasonic cameras have fallen to 30% in the Minneapolis rental houses. 90% to 30% in this town in the last 2 years is one hell of a swing. I'm still loyal and own an AF100, which I like a lot, as well as an HPX170, and a GH2, but for the first time I'm feeling the temptation to move to a different camera company. I truly hope Panasonic does well with the HPX250 and come out with a large sensor AVC-Intra camera soon. The m43 sensor, when stopped down, can have a similar look to a 1/3 inch sensor, and with fast lenses can get amazing shallow DoF. It's the best of both worlds. Maybe Panasonic needs to make a m43 camera the shoots both AVCCAM and AVC-Intra both to P2. I'd buy it for sure as long as it comes out in the next 6-8 months. OK enough venting, thanks for listening.
 
Brian, I get it...but if you dislike the AVCHD codec so much why don't you shoot with a ninja, nano, etc? For our uses I have not been able to justify an external recorder simply because AVCHD has held up so well. But, an external recorder would seemingly cure your qualm? Just my thoughts...no flame/disrespect intended.
 
Andrew J. Allsbury said:
Brian, I get it...but if you dislike the AVCHD codec so much why don't you shoot with a ninja, nano, etc? For our uses I have not been able to justify an external recorder simply because AVCHD has held up so well. But, an external recorder would seemingly cure your qualm? Just my thoughts...no flame/disrespect intended.
Click to expand...

Is part of the frustration that you can't rent out the gear anymore as well as you used to?

My personal opinion is that cameras themselves are advancing so quickly in terms of price/performance ratio that in 2-3 years the rental rate will be included in a competitive day rate. Hell in 5 years 4k will be on cellphones. Just a sign of the times. It's just a tool.

Chaz
 
Yeah renting it is part of the issue. I do rent external recorders when needed and will probably get a Samurai soon. I'm more frustrated that I might have to leave a company I am loyal to that's my biggest issue. I hate doing that. Usually if a company takes care of me I am loyal. The fact is I am more and more having to rent an external recorder for my own work and less and less able to rent out my camera to others. Not because of performance, because I can get an amazing image from it, but because the AF100 and Panasonic are getting a bad wrap in town.
 
Like you I was always a "Panasonic fan" because they seemed to favour a robust codec over optics in their pro-sumer cameras - Sony seemed to take the opposite route and favour good optics but inferior codecs. Coming from a post-production background I know how important a decent codec is.

I too was a little surprised when I learnt that the AF100 recorded to AVCHD. But after seeing it in action (and now owning my own AF100) I think that Panasonic made a smart move. The codec is designed for recording to SD Cards - which keep the costs and size down. And it is a very good codec. Better than 35 mb/s XDCAM - maybe more comparable to 50 mb/s XDCAM... but in a smaller, more affordable package.
 
Better than 35 XDCAM yes, better than 50 XDCAM no so much. That's beside the point tho. The fact that it's not P2 is killing Pany's overall reputation in town.
 
wow, the AF100 doesn't shoot to P2 . . .alert the press!

Excuse my sarcasm, but your logic on how the AF100 can kill "Pany's overall reputation" in Minneapolis is a little circular. FWIW almost everyone feels a little pain when new gear comes out. Just imagine how all those folks with $90K Sony HDcams (and even more pricey decks) feel right about now.
 
I think P2 was always a non-starter. It is just too expensive and the timing of using a PCMCIA interface just as the hardware was being phased out was just unfortunate (I know P2 is still used and a viable option for some but I'm thinking that group is now a minority).

I think Panasonic realised that if they wanted to launch a successful camera for the DSLR filmmakers they would have to go with either SD Card or CF Card. I think they made the right choice.
 
There's no way I would be able to afford to own any HD camera right now if it weren't for SD cards and AVCHD, yet I've been able to acquire two of them in the last year. I'm learning tons, shooting the best looking video of my life, making a little bit of money, and teaching other people about production again -- life is getting better. I have as much gear lust as anybody and don't exclude the idea of acquiring an external recorder or a P2 or similar camera in the future, but for right now the AVCHD Panasonics have hit the sweet spot for me. Years of experience running a facility that was about 90% Sony kind of soured me on them decades ago; they overcharged for middling performance, and something or another was breaking all the time (although in fairness, we did work the living daylights out of the gear). There is no meaningful place to rent equipment within 100 miles or so of home, and I've always preferred to own as much of my own stuff as possible, anyway, because there's nothing like literally living with it to learn all the nuances of squeezing the best performance out of a piece of gear. I'm still excited whenever I pick up one of my Pannys (and that's not to say I'm not aware of their limitations), and that's about the best one can expect from any piece of technology. Someday, hopefully not too soon, I will find something new that I like even better and will trade them in -- but for now, there is no more practical and satisfying solution out there for me.

Other people will certainly have different needs, and if there are enough of them, the manufacturers are all about identifying a market segment and producing something to fill it. At the same time, there is no perfect technology, and you need to be realistic about going with what you can get that meets as many of your needs as possible at a price you can afford. The AVCHD products approach this balance pretty optimally for me right at the moment, and when they don't anymore, there will be something better to replace them, the laws of physics and economics permitting. (Next up: Neutrino-cam! Record things that haven't even happened yet!)

- Greg
 
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A huge selling point for us was that the AF-100 WASN'T a P2 camera. I don't want to carry around $10k of "cards" on production trips; plain and simple. AVCHD is an amazing codec and it's only going to get better as SD cards get faster and faster. If you want higher quality, then use a nanoflash so whats's the problem?
 
Kindredmachine said:
A huge selling point for us was that the AF-100 WASN'T a P2 camera. I don't want to carry around $10k of "cards" on production trips; plain and simple. AVCHD is an amazing codec and it's only going to get better as SD cards get faster and faster. If you want higher quality, then use a nanoflash so whats's the problem?
Click to expand...

Are SD cards 100% reliable? P2 cards pretty much are. The option to use the P2 should be available.
 
Kindredmachine said:
A huge selling point for us was that the AF-100 WASN'T a P2 camera. I don't want to carry around $10k of "cards" on production trips; plain and simple. AVCHD is an amazing codec and it's only going to get better as SD cards get faster and faster. If you want higher quality, then use a nanoflash so whats's the problem?
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That's why I said they should have had both options. The P2 version and the AVCCAM version. As for renting a Nano that's what I do. It just cost more for me and the client if I bring 2 separate pieces of equipment. One piece of equipment that recorded a 422 I-Frame codec would save everyone money.
 
P2 is SD card ! 4 SD in one P2 card...
AVCHD is pretty limited for "professional" use, i mean small flexibility in color correction, difficult to track fast-moving object.
and about AF-100; even throught a recorder you got 8 bit stream, so color banding can also appear ; that's a big inconvenient of AVC HD codec too.
maybe P2 card must be more affordable, mainly since the technologie of high-speed SD-card is.
But P2 card is a broadcast standard and broadcast industry is able to pay the high-price ... supply and demand... it's a pitty for low budget project.
 
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There hasn't been sd cards in p2 cards for some time.

As to avchd being limited for "professional" use, I guess I'll just give my clients their money back for both the broadcast commercials and other high end shoots I do for them.

Come on.
 
There hasn't been sd cards in p2 cards for some time. Really ? http://www.dvxuser.com/articles/P2/

I'll just give my clients their money back... I do the same thing, when i say broadcast and professional i think about high"-enough"-end production ( Tv film, commercial, cinema.. )
 
Yeah really.

Instead of quoting an article from when p2 came out, let's go to the source:
http://www.panasonic.com/business/provideo/p2-hd/faqs.asp#p2-cards

WHAT'S INSIDE A P2 CARD?
P2 cards are high-precision micro-computers with their own processors, firmware, a RAID controller, and gigabytes of the highest-quality zero-fault solid-state memory chips. A P2 card is an intelligent device that manages the data files — and even does a write-verification step for every byte of memory that gets written to the card (thus assuring fault-free operation). Early P2 cards were manufactured using actual SD memory cards in a striped RAID array, thus increasing the performance far beyond any individual memory chip’s speed. The newest generation of P2 cards dispenses with using individual SD memory cards and actually uses the core memory components.
 
no worry i will not try to make P2 card with my own SD... don't know about new generation of P2.
By the way, what difference between different P2 series ?

greeting.
 
There is one reason why P2 is still popular....


There are many people/companies/studios invested in it....to alienate them by discontinuing P2 in favor of SD would hurt Panasonic's reputation. P2 has a reputation for being expensive and rock solid, even though it is yesterday's technology, while SD has a reputation for being cheap and unreliable, despite the fact that many mid-high end cams us it now. The age-old perception that "it must be good because it's expensive" holds true to this day....change is a hard pill to swallow and those who have thousands invested in P2 will have a difficult time letting go for something smaller, better, faster, and more affordable. Those pros who cry that P2 is the best are the same guys who cried that film was the best when digital was introduced and held onto their rolls of Kodak ISO 100 until they just couldn't get it developed any more....eventually they woke up and switched to digital.

Sure, P2 is dependable...but so is SDHC...are SD cards as reliable as P2 cards? It depends....Sandisk? maybe...Transcend? perhaps not so much.....but they all work, and many of the newer cameras allow you to record to two SD cards at once as a backup...P2 is a dying technology, as it should be....it offers nothing that a top of the line SDHC card doesn't offer, but at a fraction of the price.

If you like P2 and you enjoy spending $650 on 1 hours' worth of recording time, then by all means do it..You're only fooling yourself though...technology advances quickly and what was the best yesterday is not necessarily the best today....

unless you're still playing Pac-Man on the Atari 2600....that IS still the best!


Here's one more vote for seeing AVC-Intra onto SDXC cards.

Also, the HPX250 will be the last P2 card camera in its class.
 
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